Thermalito >> A grass fire that may have started at the edge of Oro Dam Boulevard West threatened two mobile homes and four trailers Thursday afternoon in Thermalito.

Cal Fire-Butte County firefighter Jesse Barnes said his crew was at another location when they were diverted around 3 p.m. to the fire on Oro Dam, west of 14th Street.

Barnes said the fire started off the roadway at a wide shoulder on Oro Dam.

Apparently, the blaze crossed over a ditch and moved uphill toward Chateau Mobile Estates. The flames burned about two feet into the yard of one mobile home, several feet onto a trailer storage lot at the mobile home park that housed four trailers, and threatened another mobile home on the other side of the storage area.

Philip Reyes, 18, was visiting his dad in the mobile home nearest the vacant lot that was on fire. He said he looked outside, smelled something strong, rushed outside, and grabbed a hose to put out the flames burning on his side of a chain link fence. The fence separated the vacant lot from his father's yard in the park.

"I was pretty scared," Reyes said.

A woman who lives in the park said there are about 100 spaces in the senior park. The trailer storage lot is also part of the park, she said.

Another resident, Barbara Hill, said she was upset about the fire because the landlord wasn't keeping the grass in the vacant lot cleared. Her home is next to Reyes' father's home.

"I was on the verge of calling the fire department to come do something about it, and it caught fire," Hill said.

Hill was sitting in her garden when she saw smoke coming from the highway.

Her own back yard had been cleared of tall grass because she had hired someone to mow the space around her home. She took the cost of the work off of the rent.

Firefighters remained on the scene for more than an hour, investigating the fire and mopping up.